


Secret

by Lirillith



Category: Final Fantasy VI
Genre: Gen, Maps, Mid-Canon, Secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-26
Updated: 2006-03-26
Packaged: 2017-10-22 10:23:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/237071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lirillith/pseuds/Lirillith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The party tries to track down Locke.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Secret

It was because of him that Terra found the note.

She'd learned from Locke early on, in the mines and the castle and especially in the tunnels they'd used to reach South Figaro, how to identify likely-looking nooks and hiding places. She'd learned to pick simple locks, too, and while he'd tried to keep her from picking up certain free-spirited attitudes toward the property of others, he hadn't been entirely successful. She didn't steal, unless looting abandoned houses for supplies or taking a half-buried sword from a cave counted, but she was known to run into trouble for picking up a book someone else had been reading or wandering into the stockroom of a store just to browse.

Terra's inclusion in the group in Jidoor had been almost an afterthought; the plan had been for her to rest after she'd been hurt fighting Phunbaba, but she'd been feeling well and Cyan hadn't. Celes had been the one to insist they go to find the portrait, once she learned of it, and Edgar had said "Clues about lost imperial treasure? An item to call back wandering spirits?"

"You heard that too? Even if the clues are just a rumor, maybe _he_ thought they was something to be found there, so we might find some leads," she'd said, and he'd nodded. But there'd been no visible clues in the painting; Gestahl sat in a thronelike chair of crimson velvet and gold-tinged, or perhaps gilded, wood. There were no maps on the desk at his side, there was no globe in the background, no letter in his hand, nothing that might point them to a secret. Setzer tried to find natural features or the lines of a map in the folds of his robes, but nothing looked recognizable; the folds appeared to be folds. Then Terra darted forward and ran her hands around the frame over Celes's sound of protest.

"What's the matter?" she asked, as she lifted the painting from the wall.

"That's... you aren't supposed to touch artwork!" Celes finally sputtered, sounding scandalized. Edgar began to laugh, but Setzer said "I'm inclined to agree with her, Terra."

"Hush. This is important," she said, running her fingers over the backing of the painting, then, "Hm. Edgar, pass me your penknife?"

"What?" He cleared his throat. "Terra, I hated the man in life too, but vandalism—"

"I think I found something," she said mildly, and immediately, both Setzer and Celes proffered blades.

In the end he used the edge of one of Setzer's throwing cards to slice away the envelope affixed to the back of the canvas itself. When she opened it, she found a note inside; she unfolded it, smiled to herself at something she saw, and offered it to Celes.

"'The treasure is hidden where the mountains form a star'?" Celes repeated. "What is this? This isn't Gestahl's handwriting, is it?"

"I don't remember it," Terra said.

"Surely not," Edgar said, looking over her shoulder. "Setzer, would you know?"

"I'm not certain... it doesn't look very much like it, but I only really saw his signature," he said. "Locke's, perhaps?"

"No," Edgar said. "Too neat for that. Terra, you smiled, earlier - what was that about?"

"Look in the corner," she said. "In pencil, there— you see?"

Celes covered her mouth with her hand. It was just an L, but it was enough to make a wild hunch look far less wild. "It... could be a smudge or a, a doodle or something," she said.

"It's a cursive L," Terra said, even though it had been doubts of her own that had kept her from speaking up before. She'd learned early on that while the nooks he pointed out seldom held anything of value, he still loved to find them, that he loved maps and hints and clues and secret passages. She could see him either leaving the clue for them after obtaining it elsewhere, or putting it back after finding it on the painting; once they found him, she'd ask which it had been.

"Where do the mountains make a star?" Celes asked, and Setzer, sliding the card back into his deck, said "Well, we _can_ view them from above...."


End file.
